


Just Like Taffy

by zarabithia



Category: Captain America, Marvel, Marvel 616
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-20
Updated: 2010-12-20
Packaged: 2017-10-13 22:07:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/142220
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zarabithia/pseuds/zarabithia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Being Captain America's friend has never been particularly easy on Sam.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Just Like Taffy

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Greensilver (Trelkez)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trelkez/gifts).



Leila had asked Sam, once (more than once, if he was being honest), how he could bear to always play second fiddle to Captain America. Sam understood the question, because he knew how their partnership looked to Leila, and to some of her fellow friends in the movement.

It grew frustrating, at times, always being pulled between his love for Leila and his loyalty to Cap. It made him feel like taffy, at times, being stretched between two competing loyalties. He would never blame Leila, though, because he understood where her question came from.  
Because, while Sam didn't need all the fame that came from being _Captain America_ or an Avenger, and while he definitely knew that Cap never viewed him as anything less than an equal, Captain America definitely cast a large shadow. There were times when even Sam grew tired of everything that accompanied being Captain America's partner.

Well, _almost_ everything. There was still _Steve Rogers_ to consider.

Sam knew that Steve didn't draw the sharp lines dividing himself from his heroic identity, the way that other heroes did. When Steve Rogers looked in the mirror, it was always Captain America he saw, and if there ever had to be a personal sacrifice for Steve Rogers in order for Captain America to continue, Steve would take that sacrifice willingly, each and every time.

But for Sam, it was hard not to draw those lines. Captain America was his partner, but Steve was his friend. Captain America wore the flag and tried hard to represent everything _good_ that came with those stripes, but it was Steve who Sam felt free to point out everything _bad_ about what that flag represented. Maybe Steve didn't need that separation, but Sam did, because that flag cast an even greater shadow than Captain America himself did.

Sometimes, however, Sam would allow that those two identities blurred together in a way that even he was incapable of separating. Shortly after what should have been a victory for them both, they were back in Sam's apartment and Sam's skin still felt nearly frozen through from the December ice and wind.

Steve, on the other hand, was looking particularly morose, despite the fact that a mere ten minutes ago, he'd stood triumphant and proud over a pair of would-be grinches, and been surrounded by a crowd of grateful citizens, happy to show their gratitude in hugs.

Leila didn't buy that Steve never got annoyed with the hugs. Sam supposed he wouldn't buy it, either, if he didn't witness it so often with his own eyes.

"So, I don't know about you, but I was chalking up the stopping of the Neo-Nazi attack on the synagogues as a _win_ ," Sam said, after Steve brought them both a cup of hot chocolate. Sam thought about pouring something warmer in the hot chocolate, because he didn't have super soldier defenses against the kind of cold that got into your veins after being out all night in it.

Steve looked up from the considerable frown he was giving his hot chocolate. "Of course it was."

"Then what's wrong?" There was plenty to be miserable about, simply based on the fact that Neo-Nazis existed, but Cap fought terrorists every day, and had been fighting bigoted scumbags since the Forties.

Sam knew Steve still took the terrorists to heart, and occasionally got a bit down in the dumps about the fact that people were determined to carry on the type of ideologies he'd fought so hard against during the War. But Cap was good at keeping that bottled up, and only letting the occasional frown show his displeasure about those things. The mood he was carrying ran deeper than the lines on his face.

"It's nothing, Sam."

"Steve, you just made us both a cup of hot cocoa, without once mentioning the _miracle_ of instant cocoa," Sam reminded him gently. It wasn't the cocoa that made Sam suspicious, the way it would have, had it came from anyone else, but the pure lack of mention of the Sarah Rogers' way of cooking that let him know something was off with his friend.

"That predictable, am I?" Steve asked.

"Sometimes," Sam admitted. "It's part of your charm. I know this time of year must be hard for you, with everyone that you've lost. Is that what's on your mind?"

Steve shook his head. "Last year, I met Bucky's sister for the first time."

The minute that Bucky's name slipped out of Steve's mouth, Sam thought that he should have known. The heavy cloud of grief that hung over Steve when it came to Bucky's tragic death was unlike any other. Sam thought that maybe he should have recognized the signs by now.

"I didn't know Bucky had a sister."

"Neither did I, until I met her." Another reason the divide between Steve and Cap was so useful was that there was no way that the guilt on Steve's face would have looked appropriate with the Cap costume on. "I spent the holidays with her last year, and I promised I'd tried to show up again this year."

Sam stole a glance at the clock. "Our little party tonight got in the way, I take it?" Because a woman who was the same physical age as Steve probably wouldn't make a habit of being awake at four in the morning.

"I called her before we went out, told her I'd probably not make it," Steve confessed. "And I took the presents over a couple of days ago, for the kids."

"But you're still feeling guilty about not making it in time for dinner," Sam guessed. At Steve's sheepish smile, Sam sighed and curled his fingers around his mug. The cocoa had cooled down, which was a shame, because Sam's fingers were still frozen, bone deep. "You know you saved a lot of people today, Steve."

"I know. But she's all that's left of Bucky and I can't feel like I'm letting her down."

Sam had a pretty good idea that, in fact, the old woman understood just fine why Captain America couldn't show up when he was needed elsewhere. But he saved his breath, because that wasn't the point they were arguing at all.

"And you feel like you let Bucky down, all over again," Sam guessed.

Steve just closed his eyes and gave a silent nod.

Sam considered his words for a moment, and thought of Leila. Leila, who thought Cap was always strong, always unyielding in his righteousness, and never with a moment of self doubt. Leila saw him through the eyes of the world, and wouldn't have been able to reconcile what she saw in Cap with the man sitting at Sam's table.

But Sam could, because Sam saw him through the eyes of a partner. "I never met the kid, but he'd be proud of you, for what you did tonight," Sam insisted.

"He usually was," Steve said quietly. "And look where it got him."

"It got him to the same type of sacrifice that you were both willing to make," Sam chided gently, because sometimes appeals made to Steve's sense of duty worked where appeals to common sense didn't. "

"I would have gladly made the same sacrifice if Bucky would have been able to keep his life," Steve argued.

"Then I'd be sitting here, listening to him feel guilty about you losing your life instead," Sam answered.

"I wish that's the way things had turned out." Steve's jaw set angrily, before he bowed his head. "I didn't realize when I was signing up, that out of all the sacrifices I would be willing to give, the war would demand the one I wouldn't be so willing to give."

"What if you had the choice?" Sam asked. "And could save Bucky, only at a greater cost?"

"I - he would have been furious at me," Steve said quietly, the smallest of smiles quirking at his lips. "For not being able to answer that the right way, as fast as I should. He'd be even more furious that I was being this 'unfun' at Christmas time."

"Tell me," Sam said, desperately catching upon a theme that sometimes worked, "about your Christmases together."

"It's late," Steve protested. "I'm sure you want to get to bed. You and Leila have plans tomorrow -"

"You and I have plans tonight," Sam answered. "I'm going to make a pot of coffee and you are going to start talking."

Steve glanced at him for a moment, briefly letting the awkward art geek take over - another one of the things that made the dividing line between Cap and Steve so useful to everyone but Steve Rogers. Sam waited for it to pass while he poured the water, because it always did. By the time the coffee began to brew, Steve was leaning back in his chair, head tilted towards the ceiling, and recalling memories of a Christmas dance gone by.

Sam took two cups to the table, one for each of them, but Steve ignored his all together. When you had super soldier serum, you didn't need coffee to stay awake, Sam supposed.

But Sam, on the other hand, needed the coffee, because Steve just kept talking, once the art geek gave way to Bucky's former partner. He talked for far longer than Sam suspected that the Christmas dance actually lasted, detailing every terrible joke, awkward dance move and facial expression. Steve spoke about his former partner the way his hands would have painted him - all movement and emotion, full of teasing and laughing, even in the middle of a war that would cost him his life.

By the time Steve stood up and took their cups to the sink to wash them out, Sam's eyes had long since grown heavy and his limbs warm with the need to call it a night. But he knew he'd done the right thing when Steve turned to him, looking less morose than he had at the start of the night.

"I'm sorry for keeping you up so late, Sam."

"It's no problem. You needed to get that off your chest."

"I kind of did. I'll never stop missing him, but sometimes it's good just to remember the man he was ... instead of just the way he died. Thanks for reminding me of that."

"That's what friends are for."

Steve hugged him goodnight, and walked out into the snow. Sam double checked that the alarm was set, and went to bed, certain he understood his best friend's dead buddy a little better than he had before. His last thoughts, before drifting off to sleep, were that he hoped Steve would find some peace someday, concerning Bucky.

Years later, Sam was still hoping that Steve managed to find the kind of peace that he'd never achieved in life, as Sam sat next to Bucky, bandaging Bucky's wounds. He grumbled reminders of Bucky's mortality that he was sure Bucky ignored and sat back, prepared to give a lecture on the recklessness of Bucky's behavior.

Sam understood _why_ the kid had taken such a reckless choice. It was plain to see, written all over Bucky's face. That feeling of being ripped down the middle because of his loyalty to Steve, just like taffy, was one Bucky knew pretty well.

But that didn't make it the right choice, even if it was understandable.

"That was an unnecessary risk," Sam began, as Bucky poured a considerable dose of vodka into his hot cocoa.

"Yeah, but it worked," Bucky answered, and for a brief moment, he smirked with the kind of grin that took Sam back to the Christmas in his apartment, when Steve had taken such pains to describe that grin. The loneliness of losing his partner wasn't something Sam had to imagine anymore, and the urge to scold Bucky faded away. "Thanks for having my back, Sam."

"No problem, kid." Sam took the bottle when Bucky offered it. "That's what friends are for."


End file.
